Scribbles of a Cyber Mom and Long distance wife living alone in a foreign land, fullfulling her free time by cross stitching, cooking, baking and stashing...........

Thursday, August 30, 2007

My trip to Hangzhou ....

I will not write anything on stitching for this entry....instead enjoy my findings in Hangzhou, China!!

We visited Hangzhou on our first weekend in China. We had decided to spend the weekend there just to kill time and go for some sight seeing. We hop into an express bus and it took us 2 hours to reach Hangzhou. Basically, Hangzhou is a tourist city and the most popular spot is West Lake Garden (it remind me of the Summer Palace Garden in Beijing :))). We did not cover much places since decided to keep it for the next time once we have permanently based in China.

We are very impressed with the express bus service....the bus is very clean, on time and even serve mineral water free on board (I hope it's the safe one!!).....same goes for the bus in the city its clean and punctual...for 2 yuan you can take a ride anywhere in the city...one thing I notice the public bus make an automatic announcement everytime it make a stop .......it has been a very fullfilling experience riding the buses in China.....

Beside West Lake Garden, Hangzhou is also famous for its tea, silk, silk umbrella and chop sticks.....these are a must buy if you are in Hangzhou.

This is the city of Hangzhou from the hotel window.....

This is some of the views at Westlake Garden. The lake is full of lotus plants and they are soo loveeelyy in the summer.....I took these photos at 7:30am and as you can see some of the ladies are doing their exercise routine (group dancing by flipping fan on their hand...quite interesting)

Shopping time......

On the left is a place called Wushan Market (I hope I got this right!)....this place full of souvenier gifts ranging from silk dress, fans, umbrella, key chain, pewter items etc...etc..etc...

On the right side is Silk Market. This place is very huge and long, about 2-3 blocks I guess....the is a small Muslim coffeeshop at the right side of the entrance

Conclusion, one day is not enough to cover these two places especially the Silk Market. I don't do much shopping since I am not into it unless if I find something on cross stitching..........

An array of fabrics at one of the shops at the Silk Market.

Finally, the bus station in Hangzhou. As you can see here,

all are in Mandarin including the tickets so it's all up to you to figure it out so that you end up at the right destination (LOL)....